About This PhD Project

Project Description

This PhD will be part funded by SAGES, the Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment and Society (http://www.sages.ac.uk/), in a competitive process. ** The closing date for applications is January 26th 2018.** Interviews are schedule for 19-21 February 2018 and will take place in Edinburgh.

The remaining funding will be provided by an EPSRC Doctoral Training Partnership studentship.

The overall aim of this PhD is to develop the use of millimetre wave radar for applications in geosciences, focusing on volcano-glacier and ice-ocean interactions.

Cats Eye Receiving Deluxe Purse Bag Printing Small Portable Amazing Green Millimetre wave radar offers a key advantage over conventional optical survey methods in its ability to map terrain with high resolution whilst operating in conditions of reduced visibility. The AVTIS radars developed at UStA by Macfarlane & Robertson for volcano imaging [1] have demonstrated the potential for such instruments to map topographic change on volcanoes through complete obscuration (e.g. ash, clouds). In addition to topography, the millimetre wave radar can measure reflectivity and the velocity of moving targets, including high spatio-temporal resolution mapping of rainfall.

DEM extraction and the discrimination between terrain types based on reflectivity, or normalised radar cross section (NRCS), will be developed and refined for improved classification of different terrain surface types. These are central to the study of volcano-glacier interactions and related hazards, which are still poorly understood (e.g. the 2010 Eyjafjallajökull eruption) as critical periods of activity during eruptions are often obscured. The AVTIS radar will elucidate changes in the volcano and glacier geometries, impacting eruption timing, magnitude or meltwater-induced mass movements e.g. lahars. The first case study will thus target ice-capped volcanoes (e.g. Iceland).

The calving of icebergs at the margins of glaciers and ice sheets is critical to our understanding of the near future contribution of the Greenland Ice Sheet to sea level rise. Continuous monitoring of grounded ice margins under conditions of heavy cloud cover and precipitation is thus needed, where conventional techniques (LIDAR and time lapse photography) are rendered useless. The ability of the millimetre wave radar to generate DEMs under these conditions will be invaluable. The second stage of the project will thus be glacier mapping with the AVTIS-2 radar, which has never previously been reported in the literature.

The project will follow broadly this structure:

* Develop improved DEM extraction methodology using existing AVTIS data. Initially using LIDAR data from a coincident survey of a local quarry as ground truth, methods for DEM surface extraction from the AVTIS radar data sensing volume will be investigated and refined. These new methods will be evaluated against existing AVTIS datasets (mainly data from the Soufriere Hills Volcano, Montserrat). Additional data for algorithm development can also be acquired locally.

* Gather millimetre wave NRCS data of glacier ice as function of incidence angle using the AVTIS-2 radar on field campaign to e.g. Iceland and develop an empirical model suitable for radar performance prediction.

The supervisory team for this PhD will consist of:-
Dr Duncan A. Robertson [Director of Studies], Dr David G. Macfarlane: School of Physics & Astronomy, University of St Andrews (physics / mm-wave radar)
Dr Brice Rea, Dr Matteo Spagnolo: School of Geoscience, University of Aberdeen (glaciology/spatial analysis)
Dr Luca De Siena: School of Geoscience, University of Aberdeen (volcanology)
Prof. Doug Benn: School of Geography & Sustainable Development, University of St Andrews (glaciology)

**If you are interested in this PhD please contact Dr Robertson.** APPLICATION DEADLINE 26 JANUARY 2018

https://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~mmwave/

Funding Notes

This PhD will be part funded by SAGES, the Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment and Society (http://www.sages.ac.uk/), in a competitive process. ** The closing date for applications is January 26th 2018.**

The remaining funding will be provided by an EPSRC Doctoral Training Partnership studentship.